Melting glaciers break record, warns UN – 04/21/2023 – Environment

The world’s glaciers melted at breakneck speed last year, a phenomenon that seems impossible to stop, warned the UN (United Nations) this Friday (21).

The last eight years have been the hottest on record, while concentrations of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide have reached new records, recalled the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

“Antarctic sea ice has reached its lowest level and the melting of some European glaciers has literally broken records”, warned the WMO, a specialized agency of the United Nations, in its annual report on the state of the world’s climate.

Sea levels also reached record highs, with an average rise of 4.62 millimeters per year between 2013 and 2022, double the level recorded between 1993 and 2002.

In addition, record temperatures were recorded in the oceans, where about 90% of the heat trapped on Earth by greenhouse gases ends up.

In the 2015 Paris Agreement, countries agreed to limit global warming to “well below” 2°C, preferably 1.5°C, compared to 1850-1900 levels.

According to the WMO report, the global average temperature in 2022 was 1.15°C above the 1850-1900 average.

Likewise, in the last eight years, global average temperatures have reached record highs, despite the cooling caused by the meteorological phenomenon La Niña for three consecutive years.

Greenhouse gas concentrations reached new global highs in 2021 and continued to rise in 2022.

“Losing game” for glaciers

The glaciers the researchers use as a benchmark lost an average of more than 1.3 meters in thickness between October 2021 and October 2022, a much greater drop than the average over the past 10 years. Since 1970, the glaciers have lost about 30 meters in thickness.

In Europe, the Alps broke glacier melt records due to a combination of low snowfall in winter, a dust intrusion from the Sahara in March 2022, and heat waves between May and early September.

“For glaciers, the game is already lost,” Petteri Taalas, secretary general of the WMO, told AFP. “The CO₂ concentration is already very high and sea level rise is likely to continue for thousands of years.”

In the Swiss Alps, “last summer we lost 6.2% of glacial mass, the highest amount ever recorded.”

“This is serious,” he warned, explaining that the disappearance of glaciers would limit the supply of fresh water for humans and agriculture, as well as damage transport connections if rivers became less navigable.

That will represent “a big risk for the future,” Taalas said. It is not possible to stop the melting “unless we create a way to remove CO₂ from the atmosphere”, he adds.

glimmers of hope

Despite the bad news, Taalas said there is reason for optimism.

He said that the means to combat climate change are becoming more accessible, because green energy is cheaper than fossil fuels, and that the world is developing better methods of mitigation.

The planet is no longer heading towards warming between 3 and 5ºC, as predicted in 2014, but towards warming between 2.5 and 3ºC, he said.

“In the best of cases, we could still reach a warming of 1.5ºC, which would be the best for the well-being of humanity, the biosphere and the world economy”, stated the secretary general of the WMO.

According to Taalas, 32 countries have reduced their emissions and their economies continue to grow. “There is no longer an automatic link between economic growth and rising emissions,” he said.

Unlike world leaders ten years ago, now “virtually everyone is talking about climate change as a serious problem and countries have started to act”, he added.